Abstract

[Excerpt from p. 140].Macdonald and Barron gave an excellent description and plate of the Seven-gilled Shark of Bass Strait, which they called Heptranchus indicus, quoting no authority for the specific name. The identity of this species with the supposedly congeneric Notidanus indicus Agassiz was disputed by Garman (1913). In 1873, Macdonald referred to the Bass Strait specimens as Heptranchus griseus, without stating that this was a new name, or perhaps regarding it as conspecific with the European Squalus griseus Gmelin or Hexanchus griseus Rafinesque, Günther's "Catalogue," with these names in Notidanus, having been issued in the meantime. Apparently the Australian form has no name of its own, so I am proposing one here which was suggested in a letter from J. D. Ogilby to A. R. McCulloch, dated October 22, 1909, as follows: "I have long been of opinion that our Heptranchias requires a new name and so list it as H. macdonaldi; however, as it does not occur here [Queensland], I hand it over unreservedly to you." To this, McCulloch had appended a note in his card-index: "We have received a small specimen from Port Jackson which accurately agrees with Muller and Henle's figure of H. indicus. Macdonald and Barron's figure in P.Z.S. of a specimen from Bass Straits is very good, and there should be little difficulty in deciding if it is correctly identified." It has thus remained for the present writer to instate Ogilby's name, which does not appear to have been published hitherto.